The Study
Without Fail: Muscular Adaptations in Single Set Resistance Training Performed to Failure or with Repetitions-in-Reserve.
This study shows what happened to two groups who did different types of workouts — one group pushed to exhaustion, the other stopped short. It’s like watching two teams follow different rules and seeing which got stronger, but we can’t be totally sure the differences were because of the rules and not something else.
Analysis score
Maximum 90 for a randomized controlled trial.
Where the score came from
People did one set of exercises twice a week for 8 weeks, either stopping at failure or leaving two reps in reserve. Both groups got stronger and built muscle.
Where does this study sit?
Reviews of RCTs (Meta-analyses)
Max 100Randomized Trials
Max 90Reviews of Cohort Studies
Max 85Cohort Studies
Max 72Reviews of Case-Control Studies
Max 63Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional & Case Series
Max 50Expert Opinion
Max 561 / 100
Quality score
Participants are randomly assigned to treatment or control groups, minimizing bias. The gold standard for testing whether an intervention causes an effect.
Key takeaways
Summary
Based on the study abstract and findings.
- 1The differences between going to failure or not were small and not strong enough to say one is clearly better.
- 2Both groups improved.
- 3Going to failure might have helped a little more for muscle size and jump height, but not clearly.
- 4Strength and endurance gains were the same.
Score breakdown, methodology, conflicts of interest, evidence analysis & raw study data
Publication
Journal
Medicine and science in sports and exercise
Year
2025
Authors
Thomas Hermann, Adam E. Mohan, Alysson Enes, M. Sapuppo, A. Piñero, Arman Zamanzadeh, Michael D. Roberts, Max Coleman, P. Korakakis, Milo Wolf, Martin C. Refalo, P. Swinton, B. Schoenfeld
Related Content
Claims (10)
Performing resistance exercises with effort close to muscular failure leads to increases in both the contractile proteins and the fluid-filled components of muscle cells.
You can build just as much muscle by stopping a few reps short of total exhaustion as you can by going all the way to failure during weight training.
Doing short, simple strength workouts just twice a week might be enough to build muscle and get stronger — even if you're already used to longer, more intense routines.
Doing one set of strength training until your muscles are totally tired might help you jump higher than stopping two reps early, but we’re not sure if the difference really matters.
If you're already used to lifting weights, going all the way to failure on each set doesn't give you better strength or endurance gains than stopping two reps short — at least over 8 weeks.
When resistance training is performed closer to muscular failure, muscle growth is greater due to higher total workload and longer duration of muscle contraction during each set.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional before making health decisions.